The Week in Digital

Festive fever has well and truly set in. Lights are glistening, glasses are clinking, and everyone’s last-minute shopping for those that they love. In between all of those festive endeavours, there’s been a host of digital news to whet the reading appetite.

Next week’s edition of The Week in Digital will look back on 2018 in digital, featuring content from brands like Spotify and Twitter. For now, here are the latest notable stories in digital.

HEADLINES

The race of the ride-hailing IPOs is on. Uber confidentially filed paperwork last Thursday to go public, on the same day that its rival Lyft also filed for an offering. Both planned IPOs are shaping up to be among the biggest in a spate of offerings aimed for 2019.

In other IPO news, Airbnb and Slack are considering direct listings, which would see them sell shares in an IPO directly to regular people instead of a pre-chosen group of bankers’ friends.

Instagram is testing new creator-specific accounts that will give the app’s influencers specialised tools. The new features are being tested with a small beta group before they roll out to the wider community next year.

A Google trainee cost the company £7.9 million with a misplaced ad. Talk about a bad first impression…

Ads that portray men as being hapless dads, imply women are unable to park a car or belittle men for carrying out typically ‘female’ tasks will be banned by the UK ad watchdog from next year under a new rule designed to clamp down on gender stereotypes.

A great piece by Rolling Stone which examines how technology is changing music, TV, sports and other forms of entertainment.